I can’t drive through Wellington without glancing at Carrie and smiling when we pass what used to be the Tall Poppy Cafe.

It was 2011 and we were the parents of three active children. The “creative rural economy” was just beginning its move toward the tourism juggernaut it is today. Economic Development Officer Dan Taylor’s idea of creating a robust economic driver by selling the County as more than a place with a beach wasn’t in its infancy, but it still needed fostering.

Let’s face it.
We all know what “farm-to-table,”
“locally grown,” “hand made,”
and “unique” mean. 

The shoulder seasons were the challenge. Maple in the County helped. Maybe Thanksgiving. But the flow of visitors still turned off like a faucet the day after Labour Day.

The toast of the Toronto foodie scene in May, the County’s innovative and upscale new eateries boasted sophisticated chefs, farm-to-table produce, and grass-fed beef from the back pastures. They were celebrated in Toronto Life and BlogTO. Packed dining rooms and lengthy reservation lists were the norm. 

In summer.

Come the darkness of late fall, it was pointless some nights to keep the lights on. 

And as the summer crowds retreated, the gentrification of the County’s new culinary scene was painfully exposed.

Let’s face it. We all know what farm-to-table, locally grown, hand made, and unique mean. 

Expensive.

The problem became how to welcome the locals inside retreats designed to appeal to those on a city budget, creating a genuine source of local sustenance in the lean months.

Enter Taste the County and its brilliant Countylicious. It started with a month-long campaign in November and a carefully cultivated yet sensible prix fixe menu. Residents could sample these new and exclusive establishments without sticker shock. 

And if they came once, maybe they would come again. 

Price point was key. Where the gut might have been more than willing to devour the strip loin at East & Main, the head and the pocketbook always knew better. How much? was always the question.

That’s where Carrie and I were 15 years ago, in the fall of 2011, balancing a mortgage, groceries, bills and everything else that comes with family life. A night out for two at one of the new boutique bistros was just a dream. 

And so, the look on her face was quizzical if not doubting when I arrived home from a Countylicious media event one evening and declared confidently this was the year we were going to take advantage. We were going to have a night out in one of these trendy spots we’d heard so much about, and it would be just for us.

We chose Tall Poppy and their three-course menu. I enjoyed the braised short rib and Carrie the pecan- encrusted chicken. It was the first time a Mill Street Organic passed my lips. We shared our deserts with one another — Carrie went for something chocolatey while I chose a shortcake. It was $30 each. I remember every bite. 

Not many years after its launch, Countylicious expanded to include both spring and fall campaigns. When Taste the County dissolved, the municipality and a cross section of restauranteurs picked up the torch on their own. The Waring House, Harvest, Angeline’s Inn, East & Main, and Merrill House knew what the longest-lived shops, corner stores, and businesses throughout Prince Edward County did. The summer bump will always be there. But luring locals and keeping them happy means the bills get paid all year round.

I’ve been kicking around the Gazette newsroom for more than two decades. I grew up on a farm, and I’ve had countless interactions with chefs, restaurant owners, agribusiness folks and the like. I know how hard they work 12 months of the year and how slim the margins are. 

Part of that understanding comes from working on a newspaper. It, too, is demanding, round-the-clock, week-in, week-out, and doesn’t pay much. 

For all these reasons, the Gazette’s colourful coverage of Countylicious, amplified over the last two years by Visit the County, has become a personal point of pride. With VTC’s support, we introduced readers to dining options both new and timeless. We profiled the chefs — the up-and-comers, the experienced leaders, and the odd celebrity-in-the-making.

We also brought into focus the origins of Countylicious’s seasonal menus: in the fields. We  featured the growers that tended the tomatoes, the herbs, and the mushrooms, and those developing a four-season growing cycle under glass. 

That was incredibly cathartic to this son of sweet corn and strawberry growers.

And that’s why it’s so disappointing to report that Visit the County is scaling back its local Countylicious advertising campaign this spring. 

An email in January informed us the special issue was no longer a thing. A couple of full-page ads was enough. 

The Gazette’s lavish Spring Countylicious Special Issue, which featured Evert Rosales’ famous illustrated map, donated out of his spirit of sheer joy in celebrating the local in vivid colour, as well as art covers by April Sage and Laurie Gruer, photography by Daniel Vaughn, and stories by both in-house and freelance reporters, celebrated the arrival of spring in the County. It was a community thing. 

Instead, our tourism marketing org wants to spend its Countylicious money on Instagram, chasing visitors from the city. 

I have a couple of suggestions to offer about this approach. 

The first concerns digital marketing. Why does VTC not realize the 196-year-old Picton Gazette is a fully digital publication, and link to all the vibrant editorial and artwork it helped to pay for from its high-powered, high-traffic website? 

Pages and pages of the Gazette’s Countylicious coverage feature in a special collection on our newly designed website.

VTC, which also has a fancy new website — only in its case it cost $100,000 and was paid for by the municipality — seems never to have thought its many digital visitors might want to read about Countylicious in the Gazette. 

What easier way could there be to at once promote our restaurants to a vast potential readership and support the Gazette, which is also a small local business? Even when dollars are scarce, it doesn’t cost much to cooperate. And everyone benefits.

Second is just the local culture itself. Against all the odds, print newspapers are thriving here because those very same folks that love Countylicious still enjoy a cup of coffee and the paper spread out before them. VTC’s own surveys show at least 60 percent of Countylicious patrons are locals over the age of 55. Targeted advertising and editorial make sense in a market whose denizens are far more likely to pick up a paper than scroll an endless and ad-driven social media feed.

I may be biased, but I do not believe I am alone in thinking this newspaper is a precious local heritage asset, something not just to protect, but to boast about. Still thriving in the heart of its community, even in the thick of the age of social media, it is also a tall poppy. 

And we all know what can happen to those.